Just got back from seeing this and I thought it was pretty damn good, I don't know why such bad reviews. Actually ya I do the critics must have wanted the deep personal,introspective stories of the first 2 movies, but this is the WAR of course things are going to blow up more and its going to be less character driven. Its a damn good pop corn flick so enjoy it for what its worth.But honestly the movie was acted well Marcus was probably the best played character and the movie seemed more about him and his journey rather than Connor. Of course the action is great giant robots and things blowing up all the time, this is pg-13 so theres not much blood, but honestly I didn't miss it much.The movie moves a long fast enough that you don't care about plot holes or cheesy dialog much. The movie stays away from the cliches of the last movies, it repeats some old lines but they make more sense hearing them in this movie. Its definatly not the cliche riddled mess that 3 was. Go see it if your a fan of the Terminator movies.

I've read the prequel novel and the novelization of the film, and I liked it. I'll probably get into the theater to see it in the next couple of days.

When Christian Bale signed on they had to do a lot of rewriting on the script because Connor's part was really minimal in the original.

I generally don't take anyone's word on a movie, because what people like is such a subjective thing. I happened to like T3 a lot, it didn't have the depth of the first two, but it was a good action movie and a good way to launch a new series of films.

This movie was a little better than I thought it would be. The final showdown with the T-800 at the end was pretty cool. This movie has a problem with not knowing how nuclear explosions work. You have to be very far away to keep from being flash fried or getting a lethal dose of radiation. Of course, this series couldn't really exist without suspension of disbelief. The machines really would just have to wait for the radiation to kill off the humans.

Also the timeline of these films is all messed up now and when you introduce the idea of time travel into a movie you wind up with things that have to be set in stone for the whole series to work.

Terminator Timeline (Spoilers ahead):

The Terminator (1984)

In 2029 Skynet sends a Cyberdyne Systems Model 101 T-800 terminator back in time to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor. TechCom forces led by John Connor sends Lt. Kyle Reese back in time to save her. The machine fails and Reese fathers John Connor.

Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991)

In a year that seems to be 1996 or 1997 (because Edward Furlong looks a lot older than 7 years old) a reprogrammed T-800 (whether this is the same cyborg as in the first film or just another of the same model has been sketchy with me) is sent back to defend John Connor against the liquid metal T-1000. Sarah Connor gets busted out of the mental institution she's been locked up in and they all try to prevent Judgement Day from happening in a few months by blowing up Cyberdyne Systems and destroying what's left of the T-800 from 1984. The final destruction of the T-1000 and the T-800 should have stopped this all from occurring. It didn't.

Then there was what happened in The Sarah Connor Chronicles TV series. (I never watched it so someone else will have to fill this in if any impact was made).

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003)

In 2003 a T-X terminator arrives in L.A. to kill John Connor and his lieutenants in the coming future war. A T-850 terminator is sent back to save him, but Judgement Day happens anyway. John Connor and Kate Brewster manage to survive in an abandoned military bunker in the mountains of California somewhere.

Terminator Salvation

Earlier in 2003, Marcus Wright is on death row convicted for murder. He signs a form giving his body up for science. Cyberdyne Systems gets it after his execution.

In 2018, John Connor leads TechCom forces in a resistance movement against the machines. After an unsuccessful attack on a Skynet base at a satellite array, Marcus Wright emerges from the rubble seemingly unaged. Meanwhile, Skynet is kidnapping humans and taking them to what seems to be a facility for mass execution, their main target is the teenaged Kyle Reese. Now John Connor's existence is on the line and it's up to both Connor and Wright to find a way to rescue Reese, rescue the human prisoners, and smash the Skynet complex.

Now here's where stuff gets tricky. To add dire consequences to the story Skynet is going to kill Kyle Reese. If Reese is the father of John Connor and Skynet knows it and they kill him there will be no John Connor. Thus there will be no reason to send a T-800 back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor. Thus there will be no T-800 parts for Miles Dyson to build a computer company from which will give birth to Skynet.

So killing Kyle Reese would negate Skynet's existence and save 3 billion human lives since there will be no Judgement Day. I would have thought that machines would have figured this out with their cold analytical CPUs and not tried something that would have erased them from existence.

So the movies work if you don't think about them too much. But the Terminator films are supposed to be thought provoking (at least the first two) and thusly it's easy to put together the timeline and see how it has to be set in stone and not rearranged just to make money at the box office.

Oh well, this movie is still action packed and the mechanical horrors really cool. The film is dedicated in loving memory to Stan Winston and someone related to producer Victor Kubicek (sorry, I can't remember that person's name), so that was classy. The Terminator shot at close range with the grenade launcher at the climax was very cool.

Wait, was that the same one that was going to be sent back to 1984? Hmmm...

Now here's where stuff gets tricky. To add dire consequences to the story Skynet is going to kill Kyle Reese. If Reese is the father of John Connor and Skynet knows it and they kill him there will be no John Connor. Thus there will be no reason to send a T-800 back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor. Thus there will be no T-800 parts for Miles Dyson to build a computer company from which will give birth to Skynet.

The machines didn't seem too keen on killing Reese. They had multiple opportunities but captured him instead and kept him alive. At one point a T600 appeared to be prepping him to be turned into a cyborg like Marcus (it was loading him into some kind of medical-looking machine, anyway ... didn't seem to be an execution machine). I think what they intended was this:

Capture him. Use Reese to lure John Connor to his death in 2018, effectively crushing the resistance. Turn Reese into a cyborg like Marcus, program him carefully to fulfill his role in history, and send him back to 1984 with a T800 to fulfill his destiny and bring about the rise of the machines. (They may have had to keep him around until 2029 so he would age appropriately ... maybe the machine the T600 was putting him in was some kind of stasis machine.)

It's really a shame that this film is getting a lot of hatred heaped upon it for no good reason. It's not the best movie of the year by any stretch, but it's still a good popcorn flick that I enjoyed.

People wanted this movie to fail, I think. Ever since McG was announced as the director, and the fact that Ah-nuhld wouldn't be in it. All the hateful crap I've read from the IMDB trolls is just appalling, and anyone who said what I just did would be called a MCG fanboy, or worse...

And now it's been beaten by Night at The Museum 2 at the box office. I have a feeling that it's gonna be a while before we see another Terminator movie, unless James Cameron's involved in some capacity. Heck, I can even see doubt over Christian Bale playing Batman again in the next movie because of this.

Now here's where stuff gets tricky. To add dire consequences to the story Skynet is going to kill Kyle Reese. If Reese is the father of John Connor and Skynet knows it and they kill him there will be no John Connor. Thus there will be no reason to send a T-800 back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor. Thus there will be no T-800 parts for Miles Dyson to build a computer company from which will give birth to Skynet.

So killing Kyle Reese would negate Skynet's existence and save 3 billion human lives since there will be no Judgement Day. I would have thought that machines would have figured this out with their cold analytical CPUs and not tried something that would have erased them from existence.

Well I'm no series aficianado; I haven't even seen the films in quite a while, though I think I can try to figure this out.

Well the first quoted paragraph is assuming it was only Dyson's work that brought the machines to be. I think it's logical that a "chicken and egg situation" would make the machines existing in one timeline have to happen before Dyson got ahold of the technology. It makes sense that someone (Like the ones in T3, or hypothetical people who funded and helped Dyson) thought of the idea themselves, and Dyson's discovery was only an "accelerant".

What would happen if Reese never came back? ...Well The Terminator would probably come back anyhow and complete its' job, then self-destruct or what not and be discovered on its' own... Skynet would probably still come into existance, and without major opposition to boot.

But without Reese to father John Connor there is no John Connor. If there is no John Connor then there is no reason to send a T-800 back to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor and leave pieces of itself behind for Miles Dyson to build his company Cyberdyne Systems from. So there is no Skynet.

In the past, John Connor is the reason why Judgement Day happened simply because of what he will become. In the future, Kyle Reese is the key to John Connor's existence and because of that, Skynet and Judgement Day. If he died in the future then John Connor, Judgement Day, Skynet, and the war against the machines cease to exist.

If he is so important that he must live, then he cannot die in Terminator 5. This also means that it is set in stone what has to happen. John Connor can die because what he had to do, starting the TechCom resistance, he has done. When you talk about what has to happen in time travel for things to make sense in the future you wind up with a rigid, unbendable continuity where you can't deviate from events or else it makes no sense. When Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines rearranged history things stopped making sense a little.

If Judgement Day passed by in 1997 without happening then it shouldn't have happened at all. Terminator 3 shouldn't have happened, this movie should have been Terminator 3! Then it would have made a bit more sense. SPOLIER: The Connors and the T-800 failed to prevent Skynet's "birth" by blowing up that building in T2 and this is the future humanity faces.

In history everything is concrete when you know the facts. Someone can rewrite history from their own perspective, but the truth will come out eventually. In fiction you can do what you want, but when you want to make it believable you have to make it make sense! Things happen in a straight line and can't deviate. That's how things happen and we deal with the consequences of them.

Terminator 3 screwed up everything by saying Judgement Day is inevitable and that the future can only be slightly altered, not really changed. Which is the exact opposite of what the first two films say.

Terminator Salvation seems to more or less ignore Terminator 3 and part 2 (other than JC's scar and a few passing references) as well, since that would make the storyline have to explain what they apparently didn't want to explain - Skynet's origins, and how they were affected by the events in T2. It seems preposterous to me to suggest nothing was altered by T2, but that seems to be the implication in TS. What date do they give when we see Marcus in prison? I don't remember...

Whatever though, Terminator Salvation had some of the worst writing (both in plotting and dialogue) I've seen in a major Hollywood film. I mean, it was actually bad. Like, I could have been brought in as a script editor and seriously improved it. I say this because I'm not that good of a writer, so it's sad when that is the truth on a $200 million dollar film's script.

Who out there was thinking about the convoluted Terminator paradoxes and its complex situations, and thought, "You know who could make a bang up Terminator sequel script? Those dudes who wrote Catwoman!".

It seems preposterous to me to suggest nothing was altered by T2, but that seems to be the implication in TS.

Of course nothing was altered by T2. None of the events of The Terminator were undone when Cyberdyne got blown up. Since John still existed and Sarah still remembered a Terminator coming after her in 1984, obviously the machines still rose up, John Connor still led a revolt against them, Skynet still sent a Terminator to 1984 to kill Sarah Connor, and Kyle Reese still came back to save her. Any effect the actions of T2 had was decidedly minimal, otherwise the entire first film would have been undone and the second never would have happened.